Phoenix Developing DRM-Equipped BIOS

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BIOS maker Phoenix Technologies said it is currently shopping a digital-rights-enabled BIOS system to top PC OEMs, the most aggressive use of DRM technology to date.

Phoenix executives said Wednesday that they’ve developed a prototype version of its Core Management Environment (cME) using DRM technology in conjunction with Orbid Corp., a DRM technology provider. The software was designed to assist content providers to authenticate and track software moving from PC to PC.

Although DRM technology has moved steadily forward, consumers have had some choice whether to implement it. Selected software providers in various markets, such as Intuit and Macromedia, have chosen to implement DRM, allowing consumers to choose DRM-less alternatives.

Phoenix’s efforts, however, represent a more fundamental sea change. Phoenix is a manufacturer of BIOS software, the underlying code which ties together a PC’s operating system and the system hardware. Since a personal computer must have BIOS installed to boot, a user could be forced to use the DRM technology whether he or she chooses to or not.

The final version of the cME is due to launch in the fourth quarter, Timothy D. Eades, senior vice-president of corporate marketing for Phoenix, said in an interview.

Phoenix’s customers include four out of the top five PC OEMs. Dell Computer uses a heavily-modified Phoenix BIOS from 1988 on its notebooks and desktops, a Dell spokesman confirmed, and Phoenix BIOSes have appeared in Pavilion desktops and notebooks from Hewlett-Packard.

The Phoenix-Orbid deal was designed to allow content providers the ability to “track and trace” content which might be shared from one user to the next, Eades said.

“DRM seems to be becoming a bigger and bigger issue, particularly in…entertainment,” Eades said. “Track and trace downloads and the authentication of those downloads is a big issue, but a number of companies do that. Track and trace of a particular solution, however, is done by very few companies.”

The Orbid DRM software will be built into the cME, which provides an enhanced BIOS that allows greater interaction with the operating system. While the cME isn’t directly a part of Microsoft’s Next-Generation Secure Computing Base (NGSCB), known previously as Palladium, Eades said the technology is “complementary”.

Orbid’s 4DRM software creates a secure area to store public keys, which can be used to tie any file to that specific PC. The 4DRM system creates a unique identifier for both the content as well as the system, allowing the content providers to manage the content on a user’s PC. Orbid previously developed “watermarking” solutions to identify content and prevent it from being distributed or copied, which it calls “gray trading”.

Phoenix and Orbid have created a working version of the software that Phoenix is now demonstrating for its OEM customers, Eades said. The DRM software will be shipped as a default option inside the cME package. “It’s up to the OEM whether or not to insert it on the machine,” he said. “We are offering it as a default option and it’s up to them to remove it.”

An OEM will also have to decide whether or not to allow an end user to turn the DRM feature off, Eades said.

Whether or not OEMs will adopt the new technology remains to be seen. Microsoft’s NGSCB technology is currently tied to Longhorn, Microsoft’s OS revision due in about two year’s time.

At Dell, the company purchased a BIOS solution from Phoenix in 1988, and since then has assigned Dell engineers to update it with support for the latest hardware, a spokesman said. “We make it pretty clear that Dell writes the BIOS for a particular system,” he said.

Intel ships BIOSes designed by Phoenix rival AMI with its desktop motherboards, an Intel spokesman said. Intel will discuss its own security solution, LaGrande, at its Intel Developer Forum in two weeks’ time.

The Phoenix software could also turn up in consumer electronics devices. Phoenix has relationships with several consumer electronics manufacturers, including Pioneer and Matsushita, which have announced that they will use embedded versions of the Phoenix software in their next-generation televisions. Other CE customers include Sony and Toshiba, Eades said.

“Initial customer feedback from the entertainment industry in general has been very favorable,” Eades added.

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